It was never quite enough, those intermittent doses of Catherine O’Hara
and Eugene Levy administered every few years via Christopher Guest’s
ensemble movies. Not after SCTV, where the two Canadian actors made
their names in the late 70s and early 80s, acclimating their fans to
regular hits of their fearless, nuanced, out-there comic brilliance.
Which is why the return of Schitt’s Creek is so welcome. The series, in
which O’Hara and Levy star as a fallen, formerly wealthy couple reduced
to living with their adult children in the show’s titular backwater
town, kicks off its third U.S. season on January 11, on the cable
channel Pop TV.

For Levy, who says he was “scared at SCTV to play anyone who remotely
resembled me,” Schitt’s Creek marks a departure, in that it’s “about
the straightest thing I’ve ever done in my career.” Dapper in bespoke
suits from the old life of his character, Johnny Rose, he cedes the
terrain of abject loopiness to O’Hara’s delusional Moira and to the
Roses’ offspring: their narcissistic daughter, Alexis, played by Annie
Murphy, and their pansexual fashion-victim son, David, played by Levy’s
real-life son and the show’s co-creator, Dan Levy.

The younger Levy says that in the new season the focus is now on the
self-centered characters’ figuring out how to function as a loving
family. Not that the sitcom is about to morph into The Waltons. “We’re
very slow learners in the Rose family,” he says. “No one’s learning
that much.”

Maeve (Thandie Newton), Westworld

It may be hard to pick your favorite robot among the comely gunslingers and fetching saloon girls of HBO’s hit sci-fi series. But while Evan Rachel Wood’s Dolores might technically be the show’s lead character, it’s Thandie Newton’s Maeve who—thanks to very minimal timeline trickery—has its cleanest and most compelling arc. Her awakening, her charming manipulations, and, of course, her very violent ends made for some of the most compulsively watchable moments of this highly addictive show.

Photo: Courtesy of HBO.

Lyanna Mormont (Bella Ramsey), Game of Thrones

It can be difficult for a newcomer to make a big impression within the already overcrowded cast of Game of Thrones—just ask the poor Sand Snakes. But this pint-size player won the hearts and minds of Thrones fans within her first scene, and continued to steal every other one in which she appeared—whether she was silently scowling in the background or bellowing out one of the most anticipated lines of the season: “The King in the North!”

Photo: Courtesy of HBO.

King George VI (Jared Harris), The Crown

There are plenty of characters to admire in Netflix’s dazzlingly expensive new series The Crown. The female leads, Claire Foy and Vanessa Kirby, deserve plenty of credit for turning royal sisters Elizabeth and Margaret from stiff icons into fully-fleshed human characters. But the standard for royal pathos in the series is set at the outset by Jared Harris’s George, a ruler tearfully, manfully grappling with the brutal truth of his own mortality. Though he (spoiler alert for history!) dies early on, his legacy looms over the entire series.

Photo: Courtesy of Netflix.

Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown), Stranger Things

It’s challenging enough for kid actors to turn in a believable performance, let alone one rooted in a science-fiction world that has no basis in our own reality. But the latter is exactly what 12-year-old Millie Bobby Brown was able to pull off in Stranger Things. While her eerie creation, Eleven, might have been based on a number of sci-fi/horror creations like E.T. or Carrie White, Brown brought plenty of unique pathos and vulnerability to this seemingly invulnerable girl . . . thing? Maybe we’ll find out when the series returns for Season 2.

Photo: Courtesy of Netflix.

Cassidy (Joe Gilgun), Preacher

Vampire TV tends to feature two types of bloodsuckers: the mopey and heartsick (see True Blood, The Vampire Diaries), or the creepy and repulsive (The Strain). But when’s the last time a TV vampire had this much fun? Oozing charm from underneath his sunglasses,__ Joe Gilgun’s__ Cassidy brogued his way through dispatching an entire plane of would-be vampire hunters—and that was just in his very first scene. It takes a special talent to out-maniacally grin a comic-book confection like the one Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon dreamt up, but Gilgun, somehow, pulls it off.

Photo: Courtesy of AMC.

Samantha Bee (Samantha Bee), Full Frontal

Just like Jon Stewart and, to a more extreme degree, Stephen Colbert before her, Samantha Bee isn’t being precisely herself when she stands up on TBS each Monday night to eloquently rage about the news of the week. There’s a whole team of writers who work hard to make the character of Sam Bee, self-proclaimed Nasty Woman and righteous liberal avenger. It’s not as if Bee disagrees with any of the pointed barbs she launches on Full Frontal—but we’ll call this character the ultimate version of Bee. Hers was just the voice we needed to get us through the election year, and she’ll be all the more vital in the next four years to come.

Actress Sarah Paulson proved her chameleonic prowess long ago, thanks largely to her work on American Horror Story. But transforming into famed O.J. Simpson prosecutor Marcia Clark, a real-life character the public already knew well? That was the real challenge. Paulson succeeded with flying colors—and also transformed all of our preconceived notions and expectations of who Clark was. Paulson’s sensitive treatment of the sometimes-brittle Clark couldn’t have come at a better time. America, staring down the barrel of the 2016 election’s charged gender politics, sorely needed a reminder of another brash, intelligent woman who was unfairly pilloried. Paulson’s performance may not have swayed the vote, but it provided some much-needed context for the train wreck ahead.

Photo: Courtesy of FX.

Maeve (Thandie Newton), Westworld

It may be hard to pick your favorite robot among the comely gunslingers and fetching saloon girls of HBO’s hit sci-fi series. But while Evan Rachel Wood’s Dolores might technically be the show’s lead character, it’s Thandie Newton’s Maeve who—thanks to very minimal timeline trickery—has its cleanest and most compelling arc. Her awakening, her charming manipulations, and, of course, her very violent ends made for some of the most compulsively watchable moments of this highly addictive show.

Courtesy of HBO.

Lyanna Mormont (Bella Ramsey), Game of Thrones

It can be difficult for a newcomer to make a big impression within the already overcrowded cast of Game of Thrones—just ask the poor Sand Snakes. But this pint-size player won the hearts and minds of Thrones fans within her first scene, and continued to steal every other one in which she appeared—whether she was silently scowling in the background or bellowing out one of the most anticipated lines of the season: “The King in the North!”

Courtesy of HBO.

King George VI (Jared Harris), The Crown

There are plenty of characters to admire in Netflix’s dazzlingly expensive new series The Crown. The female leads, Claire Foy and Vanessa Kirby, deserve plenty of credit for turning royal sisters Elizabeth and Margaret from stiff icons into fully-fleshed human characters. But the standard for royal pathos in the series is set at the outset by Jared Harris’s George, a ruler tearfully, manfully grappling with the brutal truth of his own mortality. Though he (spoiler alert for history!) dies early on, his legacy looms over the entire series.

Courtesy of Netflix.

Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown), Stranger Things

It’s challenging enough for kid actors to turn in a believable performance, let alone one rooted in a science-fiction world that has no basis in our own reality. But the latter is exactly what 12-year-old Millie Bobby Brown was able to pull off in Stranger Things. While her eerie creation, Eleven, might have been based on a number of sci-fi/horror creations like E.T. or Carrie White, Brown brought plenty of unique pathos and vulnerability to this seemingly invulnerable girl . . . thing? Maybe we’ll find out when the series returns for Season 2.

Courtesy of Netflix.

Misty Knight (Simone Missick), Luke Cage

There were many new comic-book characters to grapple with on TV this year, but perhaps none had as much style and ferocious panache as Simone Missick’s Misty Knight. Sporting a much more down-to-earth look than her comic-book counterpart (Missick’s Misty prefers pantsuits to catsuits), the hard-boiled detective with ties to Luke Cage’s community emerged as a bright spot in a somewhat inconsistent season.

Courtesy of Netflix.

Fleabag (Phoebe Waller-Bridge), Fleabag

One of the joys of letting a comedian like Phoebe Waller-Bridge write, create, and star in her own show is the stinging truth that emerges when someone puts their own life under the lens. Waller-Bridge’s Fleabag—a narcissistic, sexually provocative, emotionally devastated young woman—avoids the clichés of similar characters created by writers who have never actually flirted with this much darkness. Waller-Bridge would be the first to say that Fleabag is an exaggerated and much more selfish version of herself, but she also admits that many of the scenarios that drive the engine of the best black comedy of the year are ripped from her own life.

Courtesy of Amazon Prime Video.

Lacie Pound (Bryce Dallas Howard), Black Mirror

Of all the dystopian morasses the very human characters in Black Mirror have faced, the most relatable to digital-age denizens may have been the plight of Bryce Dallas Howard’s Lacie Pound. Trapped in a system where social-media ratings determine your place, access, and comfort level in society, Lacie has buried her frustrations, hopes, and personality under a bright, chipper demeanor that earns her empty approval from acquaintances—but no actual emotional satisfaction. Her eventual breakdown and rage-fueled catharsis comprised one of the most satisfying arcs on television in 2016.

Courtesy of Netflix.

Paper Boi (Brian Tyree Henry), Atlanta

Most TV fans went into Atlanta knowing what creator Donald Glover was capable of, even if they may not have quite known the depths of his dramatic chops. Other than a few appearances on shows like Boardwalk Empire and The Knick, though, actor Brian Tyree Henry was a relative unknown burdened with the task of making us all believe that he could be emerging rapping sensation Paper Boi. With his low-key vibe, Paper Boi is far from the typical megalomaniac you might see in a freshly minted star. The character comes off as generally bemused by his success, but with enough warm, sleepy charisma to make Paper Boi’s shot at fame seem like a real possibility.

Courtesy of FX.

Tahani Al-Jamil (Jameela Jamil), The Good Place

We all know someone like Jameela Jamil’s Tahani: an obnoxiously perfect person with repulsively shiny hair who excels at everything she does. She exists to make Kristen Bell’s Eleanor feel inferior. But this being a comedy from Mike Schur (Parks and Recreation, The Office, Brooklyn Nine-Nine), it’s not quite as simple as that. Tahani, we learn, has her own inferiority and loneliness issues, and Jamil’s performance perfectly nails the combination of obnoxious and sympathetic.

Courtesy of NBC.

Naz (Riz Ahmed), The Night Of

Potentially no new TV character transformed so drastically over the course of the season as Riz Ahmed’s tragic Naz in HBO’s mini-series The Night Of. Naz, who spends the first few episodes doe-eyed and physically frail (he’s asthmatic) as he watches a trap of his own making close in on him, becomes a prison-hardened, tattooed, shaven-headed, weight-lifting criminal by the series’s devastating finale. Of course, it’s Naz’s internal hardening that’s the show’s real marvel, and that’s all down to Ahmed’s performance. His eyes—once so obviously innocent—have seen horrors by the time all is said and done; though Naz may eventually get out of prison, we know he’ll never again be free.

Courtesy of HBO.

Jed (Elizabeth Debicki), The Night Manager

The easiest comparison most TV viewers made to the stylish Tom Hiddleston–starring mini-series The Night Manager was to the thrilling spy craft of James Bond. That would make Jed—played by the long-limbed Elizabeth Debicki—the requisite Bond Girl. But Jed is hardly here for eye-candy reasons. The vulnerable single mother is almost the exact opposite of the frivolous show pony she originally appears to be. It’s her struggle to break free from her supervillain of a boyfriend that gives The Night Manager its very personal stakes. Sure, she may look fabulous while fighting for her life—but isn’t that exactly what we expect from Bond, too?

Courtesy of AMC.

Christine Baskets (Louie Anderson), Baskets

Louie Anderson has gotten plenty of comedic mileage over the years from imitating his Midwestern mother. But he likely didn’t expect that he would win an Emmy for tapping into that feminine side on the surreal comedy Baskets. Christine Baskets—the Costco-loving mom to Zach Galifianakis’s Chip—struck a chord with viewers, perhaps because Anderson, one of the gentlest souls in Hollywood, played her with such sensitivity, frank Midwestern charm, and without a trace of cartoonish exaggeration. Her look may be outlandish—that Easter bonnet was delightfully extreme—but her demeanor feels real, honest, and refreshing.

Courtesy of FX.

Cassidy (Joe Gilgun), Preacher

Vampire TV tends to feature two types of bloodsuckers: the mopey and heartsick (see True Blood, The Vampire Diaries), or the creepy and repulsive (The Strain). But when’s the last time a TV vampire had this much fun? Oozing charm from underneath his sunglasses,__ Joe Gilgun’s__ Cassidy brogued his way through dispatching an entire plane of would-be vampire hunters—and that was just in his very first scene. It takes a special talent to out-maniacally grin a comic-book confection like the one Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon dreamt up, but Gilgun, somehow, pulls it off.

Courtesy of AMC.

Samantha Bee (Samantha Bee), Full Frontal

Just like Jon Stewart and, to a more extreme degree, Stephen Colbert before her, Samantha Bee isn’t being precisely herself when she stands up on TBS each Monday night to eloquently rage about the news of the week. There’s a whole team of writers who work hard to make the character of Sam Bee, self-proclaimed Nasty Woman and righteous liberal avenger. It’s not as if Bee disagrees with any of the pointed barbs she launches on Full Frontal—but we’ll call this character the ultimate version of Bee. Hers was just the voice we needed to get us through the election year, and she’ll be all the more vital in the next four years to come.

Actress Sarah Paulson proved her chameleonic prowess long ago, thanks largely to her work on American Horror Story. But transforming into famed O.J. Simpson prosecutor Marcia Clark, a real-life character the public already knew well? That was the real challenge. Paulson succeeded with flying colors—and also transformed all of our preconceived notions and expectations of who Clark was. Paulson’s sensitive treatment of the sometimes-brittle Clark couldn’t have come at a better time. America, staring down the barrel of the 2016 election’s charged gender politics, sorely needed a reminder of another brash, intelligent woman who was unfairly pilloried. Paulson’s performance may not have swayed the vote, but it provided some much-needed context for the train wreck ahead.